1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the field of retail sales by kiosk and more particularly to an automated retail kiosk vending machine that can vend cellular telephones, E-pins and accessories as well as provides an advertising screen and banking services and that has changeable presentation formats (external appearances).
2. Description of the Prior Art
Vending machines that vend various items are known in the art such as cola machines, candy machines and the like. In addition, there are kiosks or vending machines that vend telephone card minutes such as that described by Sorenson et al. in U.S. published application number 2006/0108414 and U.S. Pat. No. 7,014,108. There are also numerous kiosks that provide banking and ATM services. Generally these kiosks are not designed to be attractive or be able to change their presentation format, but rather are either rectangular boxes or are simply computer terminals and video monitors.
Kiosks can also be used to originate subscriber accounts or add minutes to existing accounts. An example of this is taught by Gary in U.S. published application number 2007/0124164. As with the previous examples, Gary does not teach making the looks of the kiosk relate to vended products or to be able to change how the kiosk looks. None of these examples allow the kiosk to vend a cellular telephone.
It would be advantageous to have a kiosk or vending machine that has exchangeable presentation formats as to how it looks (for example, rectangular or shaped like a cellular telephone, etc.) in order to relate to what it vends and therefore attract customers, where the kiosk vends actual working cellular telephones along with accessories and calling plans or E-pins as well as displaying a large advertising screen. This kiosk could additionally provide a variety of standard banking services such as check cashing, cash withdrawal, wire transfer, bill paying and any other banking services such as ATM.